


Yellow Curtains

by peachpick



Series: A World Unknown Series [1]
Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-22
Updated: 2019-12-25
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:34:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,082
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21897517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peachpick/pseuds/peachpick
Summary: When a new family from sunny California moves in Kyle Murphy, finds herself with a neighbor who understands. Someone who can see past closed doors and peer inside her life without questions she couldn't answer. Billy Hargrove could look into her room and Kyle could look into his and they'd know. Their relationship was odd and slightly intimate in that space but outside they were strangers and they'd both rather keep it that way.
Relationships: Billy Hargrove/Original Female Character(s), Steve Harrington/Original Female Character(s)
Series: A World Unknown Series [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1577389
Kudos: 7





	1. New Neighbors

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kyle Murphy has lived in the same boring town her whole life, but when she gets new neighbors she learns that Hawkins is a lot stranger than what she once believed.

**OCTOBER 21, 1984**  
**HAWKINS, INDIANA**

**KYLE MURPHY SAT** at her windowsill on the far side of her room. The window opened out to the side of the house next door where Ms. Wojciechowski had lived previously, but now new neighbors were pulling in only a week after she had passed.

The rumors around town said that Ms. W had died suddenly of a broken heart after hearing the news of her son's death. When Kyle heard the news, she felt that the rumors were exaggerating, as they always did, no one could be so in love with someone that they died. It sounded like a lazy analysis and like it was just gossip, as it was.

So, Kyle frowned, dismissing the thoughts from her head and leaned her forehead against the cool glass and watched as the moving truck and two cars made it to their destination.

A yellow Ford pulled into the driveway first, ugly and slightly rusted on the roof as the engine ran heavily like a heavy smoker. A man pulled himself out on the driver's side with dark hair neatly combed and a permanent scowl beneath his thick mustache.

Kyle watched a woman and a girl climb out of the left side of the car facing her house. The woman smoothed her dress down as she turned to her husband as her daughter followed doing the same to her pants before leaning back into the car to grab a skateboard. The two both had striking red hair and freckled faces, the mother smiling awkwardly at her daughter as she stomped to the front of the house, a scowl mimicking her father's.

Behind them, a blue Camaro roared and shuddered into the driveway beside the yellow Ford. Through the window, Kyle could feel the base of the car's radio in her room, but before she could make out the song, the engine shut off.

A boy her age stepped out of the car with dirty blonde curls and aviators that made him look as cool as ice, but it dropped in a second as he looked at his father. Kyle couldn't make out the man's face, as his back faced her, but the look on the boy's face made Kyle's frown deepen.

The blonde scowled furthered then caught the keys his father had tossed to him stomping to open the door.

The men from the moving truck had begun pulling out boxes from the truck, leaving them in their driveway as they gathered more. Kyle would have stayed to watch the new family interacting with each other but was caught by her mom's soft rapping on her door. Jenny opened the door before Kyle could respond, the faint smell of apple pie becoming choking as it wafted in behind her mother.

"We're going to meet the neighbors," her mom, Jenny, stated, nodding her head back towards the living room.

Kyle stared at her mother for a moment then turned back to her window, where she noticed the curly-haired boy leaving the room across from her window.

"They've only just gotten here," Kyle stated, turning back to her mother as she rolled her eyes.

"And they'll appreciate a warm pie waiting for them when they're finished," Jenny replied and left Kyle's room without saying anything else.

Kyle sat in her windowsill for a beat before she slowly stood and pulled on a pair of high waisted jeans instead of her shorts. She looked into the corner of her room where her sneakers waited but decided that the socks she was wearing would be fine for the journey next door.

Kyle met her parents in the doorway where they stood like a picture-perfect family and left the house to walk the distance between her home and the new neighbors.

Kyle walked awkwardly behind her parents, tugging at the long sleeves of her green turtleneck and didn't realize her parents had stopped walking before she headbutted her father's back. Edwin snapped his head back and glared down at his daughter. Kyle was just thankful that she hadn't run into her mother, who held the warm pie in her hands. If she had ended up ruining the pie in front of the new neighbors, she'd have hell to pay.

Edwin Murphy turned back to the new neighbors, a fake smile on his clean-shaven face as he held his hand out to the man of the house.

"We just wanted to introduce ourselves," Edwin explained, the man in front of him shaking his hand firmly. "I'm Edwin, and this is my wife, Jenny and our daughter, Kyle."

"Kyle?" the man asked with a slight chuckle, his eyes landing on Kyle with a raised brow.

"She's named after my brother," Jenny explained.

"Excuse my manners," the man said, raising a hand to himself. "I'm Neil, and this is my wife, Susan.

Their kids lingered behind them. The red-headed girl stared at the family with her eyebrows furrowed and the scowl still on while the curly-haired boy avoided them altogether as he continued to take his boxes inside the house.

"This is Maxine, Susan's daughter and my son—" Neil was saying, turning to look at his son but found him nowhere in sight. Hig eyebrows twitched before the pretty boy walked outside and tried to go for another box. "Billy! Come over here and introduce yourself."

Billy paused as he bent down to pick up a box, his ears burned red and straightened, smoothing out his denim jacket. He turned back to the group and kept the scowl on his lips as he approached them. He Kept his mouth in a tight line until his father gave him a sharp look that Kyle felt like she had seen before on her own father's face not even two minutes earlier.

"I'm Billy," he said through clenched teeth. "Nice to meet you."

Billy eyed the group, his eyes grazing over Kyle, and if it were any other time than now Kyle would bet all her money that he would have something charming to say, but there was something odd in meeting someone in front of your parents who were total assholes.

So, Kyle and Billy kept to themselves as Jenny handed her famous apple pie over to Susan. The adults talked for twenty minutes. Billy and Maxine walked back tot he boxes after a few minutes while Kyle stayed with her mouth closed and her eyes on her socks.

Once the Murphy's were finished talking to the Hargrove's, Edwin led his wife and daughter back home, his hand rested on Kyle's shoulder, pinching down without the neighbors noticing.

The moment the door closed, Jenny had already gone, and Edwin was fuming.

"The next time you embarrass me—!"

"Embarrass you! I barely knocked into you!" Kyle retorted, her anger boiling over.

"You made us look like fools! Did you see how Neil looked at me? As if I were a pushover and I am no pushover, Kyle!" Edwin fumed. "Do not disrespect me! Especially when we attend dinner with them. I might even ask if they would like to go out adults only so that you don't further embarrass me!"

"That's fine with me, dad! I'd rather stay at home than go out with you and your stupid friends!"

"Kyle," Edwin whispered, his voice shaking in anger. "Go to your room now!" he screamed.

Kyle rolled her eyes, but she could feel the tears prick, and so she listened and stomped down the hallway into her room and slammed the door shut. She expected her dad to say something else, but he said nothing, even as she picked up a glass and slammed it against the ground. Glass shards flew everywhere on the ground, and Kyle remembered she hadn't put on shoes.

She sighed, bending down to pick up the pieces, tears now streaming down her face. She threw the pieces in her overflowing trashcan and stood to her feet. Kyle looked up, and out of her window, the curtains pulled back and in the window next door wasn't the creepy dolls Ms. Wojciechowski used to keep in there but Billy Hargrove. A cigarette hung from his lip as he watched Kyle cry in her bedroom.

Kyle walked to the window, her hands on both curtains and closed them.


	2. Early Morning Sights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kyle sees Billy at school the next Monday and sees how uncaring and dickish he is.

**OCTOBER 22, 1984  
KYLE MURPHY'S HOUSE**

**IT WAS THE MONDAY** after the Hargrove's had moved in, and Kyle had made the mistake of staying up to reorganize her binders. Now, she was fifteen minutes off her regular morning schedule as she pulled her hair back into a messy ponytail, strands falling out all over the place while she held a piece of toast in her mouth. Once she finished, Kyle hopped around her room, her yellow curtains open as she shrugged on a yellow sweater to match the scrunchie in her hair. Kyle tugged on her high-waisted jeans, spinning in the air to come face to face with her neighbor in his room.

Both seemed to notice each other at the same time. Billy stood in the middle of his room, staring at Kyle as if electricity was shooting for her. He smirked as he buckled his belt and a red hot fire-filled Kyle's face. Uneasily, Kyle waved to Billy, slowly making her way out of her room and shooting for the doors.

Kyle had made it to the front door, her keys in her hands and went to grab her backpack before she realized she had left it in her room because of her late-night organizing. She jogged back to her room, sneakers squeaking against the wood floors as she flung into her room. Her hand rested on one of the straps, chancing another look out of her yellow curtains to see Billy talking to himself in the mirror. He had a cigarette settled lazily between his lips.

Kyle couldn't help but grimace at the sight, turning on her heel and made it out of her door for school.

Kyle pulled into the Hawkins High parking lot not even ten minutes later in her unassigned parking space beside Steve 'the Hair' Harrington. He and Nancy Wheeler sat comfortably inside his car, discussing a paper strangled in between Nancy's tense hands.

Kyle slinked out of her car, leaning herself against the windowsill and smiled to the two inside, waving her hand. The window rolled down for her, and Kyle leaned in.

"What are you two working on?" Kyle asked.

The three teens weren't close only talking during school hours, or when the opportunity presented itself, in the library for a project. Anything else and they were strangers, but Kyle didn't mind happy to have them around when she needed them.

Kyle and Steve were in the same grade. They grew up together but had always been at opposite ends of school popularity. Steve had grown from a sweethearted kid into an asshole, but in the past year, he had been with Nancy he had grown into a tolerable asshole. Kyle appreciated the effect Nancy had on him.

Kyle and Nancy, on the other hand, were quite similar by being good students and liked to keep ahead of the curve in learning, often becoming the teacher's pet and always staying out of trouble.

Although, while Steve liked parties and being the King of Hawkins High and Nancy liked flashcards and making A's on all of her tests, Kyle wanted to learn what she wanted to learn and read Steven King novels long into the haunted hours of the night.

For Kyle, school was either a popularity contest or a battle for valedictorian, and she didn't have a care for either. She didn't want the sexist white-washed histories that had been re-told since third grade or the same opinions on how the Universe was created. Kyle liked to brush herself up on the theory of multiple universes or try to hack into the school's computer system from the inside.

"My early admissions essay," Steve explained, rolling his eyes taking the essay from Nancy's hands and crumbling it. "What's the point? I'm going to end up working for my dad anyway," he sighed.

Nancy had begun softly asking Steve to calm down and reassure him. Kyle grew uncomfortable with the two, awkwardly patting the windshield.

"Alright, I'm gonna head in. Let me know if I can help."

Nancy nor Steve responded, stuck in their little lover's world as they continued to argue.

Just as Kyle was about to make her way into the school, the rev of a familiar engine rattled the parking lot. All of those in the vicinity craning their necks to look at the loud noise in the quiet town. Kyle turned just as Billy's blue Camaro whipped into a parking space near the edge of the lot, kicking up dust behind it like smoke.

Maxine, annoyed and scowling, stepped out of the Camaro as soon as it stopped and skated off towards the middle school without looking back to her step-brother.

At the driver's side, Billy dramatically rose with the echoes of Rock You Like A Hurricane following him as the student body stood in quiet anticipation of the new guy. Billy smirked at the stillness, and the eyes settled on him. Somehow, in the middle of the fray, Billy was able to find her and the smirk on his lips that had been there since that morning raised just slightly at seeing her again.

Billy sent Kyle a wink, the crowd of quiet teens erupting in gossip, but she was quick, skidding inside the high school before heads could turn and connect the dots.

In a place so boring everyone in Hawkins seemed to stretch every bit of exciting news as far as it could, and with her, she knew it could get messy. Soon enough she'd have snuck into Billy's room because they were neighbors, fucking each other and Kyle would find herself falling in love while he kept himself distant and cold.

But that was not what had happened.

Charlie Blackwood and April Byrd rested at Kyle's locker intently discussing something between each other that even when Kyle approached, said hello and begun putting up her things was unable to get a response out of them.

"I don't want to see Back to the Future next Summer, Charlie. If you were to go back in time, you'ds have to go faster than light, and I'm pretty sure a Delorean can't go faster than light, do you, Charles?"

"Ooh, Charles, that's gotta hurt," Kyle laughed, backing away from her locker with her books in hand as she tried to enter the conversation.

Charlie groaned, his hands tangled in his thick curls as he glared at April. "It doesn't have to do with how he gets back. It's just the fun of going to see what happens!"

"Not if it's politically inaccurate," April disagreed, her arms folded over her chest.

"April—"

"Guys!" Kyle interrupted, finally gaining their attention. "How about we talk about going to see Back to the Future when it comes out in the Summer. Literally, eight months from now. We won't be doing anything exciting, just like every Summer... So, you two arguing can be entertainment."

"Fine, whatever," April muttered, turning on her heel to fully face Kyle. Her almond eyes pressing as she smirked, "How was meeting the new neighbors?"

As if he had heard, Billy strolled into the school, heads turning with him. His shoulders were squared, and he walked with a strut that exuded cool, more so than Steve Harrington, the current King of Hawkins High. Although, this new kid seemed to be in the runnings of usurping the King.

He turned, his dirty blonde curls bouncing with him. The frown he had dawned faded as he smirked at Kyle's green eyes popping up wherever he went.

Billy winked her way as if it were his calling card, just to see that red blush of hers rise again and her turn away and back to her friends.

Billy was gone, and whispers filled the halls as Kyle kept her eyes trained on the bottom of the lockers while April and Charlie bore holes into the side of her head.

"So?" Charlie muttered. "It seems it went well."

"Anything you'd like to share? Maybe a new friendship, a new relationship? Anything, in particular, you'd like to share with the class," April reasoned, shrugging her shoulders.

At the ring of the bell, Kyle was off to English before answering either of her friend's questions.


	3. Bright Eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kyle's best friends interrogate her about the new kid in town.

**OCTOBER 23, 1984  
HAWKINS HIGH SCHOOL**

**THE DAY HAD** dragged on for Kyle. Math had barely crept by and bled into lunch as the bell droned for the hungry students to escape to the cafeteria. Kyle collected her freshly organized binder and trailed out of Ms. East's classroom behind Nancy and Jonathan.

Kyle had her green eyes trained on the two friends who had barely spoken before the disappearance of Jonathan's brother, Will. April had mentioned that she found the two's relationship a little strange, as they seemed to be hanging onto each other because of something and now Kyle couldn't help but wonder every time she saw them together.

Kyle was forced out of her trance by an orange invitation shoved into her chest by Tina Hoffman, who smiled wide before Nancy had caught her attention, asking for another invitation (for Jonathan).

"Hope you can join us, Kyle," Nancy grinned skipping her way to Jonathan and shoving the invitation into his chest and rattling on about him attending.

Kyle shook her head. It was none of her business what the two had gotten up to. So, she looked at the invitation with a poorly drawn ghost on the paper that she now found herself tracing with her recently painted blue nail.

"Get sheet faced?" Kyle asked to herself.

"You goin', bright eyes?" a barely recognizable voice asked as his arm slinked around her shoulders and gripped her tight and close to his side.

As if the two had known each other for years rather than talking only on a few occasions in their physics class where she had been assigned as his lab partner, Kyle stayed neatly tucked away in his Billy's arms. She turned to look into his sparkling blue eyes and awkwardly smiled up to him. Slowly, red heat found its way to her cheeks as she thought back to that morning and quickly returned to her invitation.

"I don't know," Kyle sighed as the halls grew thick with gossip that bounced off deaf ears. "I have an essay I need to work on," she explained, returning to watching the barely noticeable freckles that littered Billy's cheeks.

Billy laughed, raspy and booming, at her response.

"An essay? What essay?"

"Uh... you know, the essay in... English?"

"Are you asking me if there's an essay in English?" he asked teasingly.

"No, there is. It's what I have to work on," Kyle defended, her shoulders growing tense and suddenly paying attention to Billy's arm wrapped so comfortably around her shoulders and the eyes trailing their every move down the hall.

"Alright, Kyle, but while you're at home working on a made-up essay," Billy sighed, a slippery smirk falling onto his red lips and his blue eyes turned dark like a thunderstorm. He leaned in close to her, his breath tickling at the side of her neck as he whispered, "Halloween is a night for all the monsters to come out and play, and baby, you've met the King of them."

Kyle scoffed, shoving Billy off her and shook her head to rid her body from tingling and the mix of disgust and embarrassment from creeping on her face.

Billy laughed louder from her anxiety and tried to move in close again, bumping into Jeremy Tonoki from physics and could feel her embarrassment start to cloud her judgment.

"It's just a party," Kyle told him, rolling her eyes and bringing her binders up into her arms and close to her chest to act as a shield.

Kyle kept thinking about how Billy was nothing like the guy she had met before in front of his house. He was sweaty and tired and irritable. Something about his father coursed fear through him like her own, and he didn't want to be there.

There, in the confines of high school, Billy was safe from his father and the terrors of his house. He was more confident and could be his asshole self. He walked with Kyle like they were old friends and not new neighbors, whispering in her ear like a little girl and making plans for an adventure sometime soon that would undoubtedly fall through.

Kyle eyed him carefully watching as a smirk took up Billy's amused features watching as she tensed and squirmed under his gaze. His blue eyes kept watch over her, and he waited to strike.

"It's just a party," Billy mocked her, and Kyle was surprised to face a childish side to him. "It's a high school party. You'll never have another chance like this until college."

"Until college? That's like a million years away," Kyle laughed, the two now entering the open cafeteria filled with students who could all watch them on full display.

Tommy H. was at his table, practically screaming Billy's name to join them, but he ignored them as he kept a steady gaze on Kyle.

"Think about it, bright eyes," Billy told her, pointing a finger at her. She nodded, watching as he turned on his heel, pulling out a cigarette and walking right past Tommy H. and their table of popular douchebags to instead go outside and find himself some peace.

Kyle was standing in the middle of the cafeteria, acting like a lost puppy until she regained her thoughts and moved towards her table. Kyle sat down at her table in the corner. She unwrapped her sandwich from the plastic wrap and readied herself to eat it but not before coming face to face with Charlie's unwavering gaze judging a hole into her head.

"What?" Kyle asked.

"What?" Charlie asked, his big doe eyes hopping from her to April and back to her with his jaw hanging loose. "Are you serious? What? Were you really just talking to the Billy fucking Hargrove?"

"Didn't we establish this early on? He's my neighbor," Kyle repeated, rolling her eyes as she moved to her food and far away from the subject of Billy Hargrove but was yanked back in by April's bony fingers.

"Kyle, we know your neighbors, but since he's been here, he's racked up a pretty good reputation. Mainly an asshole, a flirt or a flirty asshole," April explained.

"The two of you walk in here like old pals, and you ask what!" Charlie scoffed, talking to himself now.

"Hey, grandma! Chill on the dementia. He was just wondering if I was going to Tina's party next week to try and get in my pants," she explained, shrugging.

April turned from her to Charlie, her eyebrows knotted and confliction reflected in her own dark almond eyes. "That does sound like the Billy Hargrove I've heard about."

"You guys haven't even met him?" Kyle asked deadpanned.

Charlie didn't respond. Rather he adjusted himself so that he transformed from grandma with dementia to delirious dad. He squared his shoulders, narrowed his eyes, and twitched his nose. Kyle believed he had been spending a little too much time at the police station because for a moment he reflected Chief Hopper, but Kyle moved past that thought as Charlie spoke.

"Kyle, just be careful. I've heard he's already bagged three chicks since he's been here and two of them have been at school! You don't want to get dragged into whatever bullshit he needs to compensate for."

"Yeah, yeah, dad. I've got a handle on it. I don't spread these legs for just anyone," Kyle assured him, patting Charlie's hands.

Charlie rolled his eyes, snatching his hands from Kyle's.

"Yeah, only for George Michael," April snorted, her head down and her hair covering her face but the coy smile making its way onto her face was ingrained into Kyle's head until her dying day.

"Oh, shove it, April! Or should I say' secretly in love with a Wookie!'"

"I am not!" April screamed in Kyle's face, turning to Charlie. "She's making things up to get under her skin."

"April, I don't judge. I just sit here waiting for graduation so I can ditch you losers."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woo! I was trying to figure out how to make this chapter longer without going into the Halloween party and it went from like two chapters of Kyle awkwardly talking to Nancy to this! So, I'm happy we moved past Nancy so we could get some good Kyle and Billy interactions.

**Author's Note:**

> Here I am on my shit again writing a Billy Hargrove fic when I told myself I'd start the Peter Parker fic I've had in my drafts for months now and the Steve Harrington I had plans for before this one. Either way I'm very excited for this story.
> 
> Thank you guys for reading and please take this story lightly because any man like Billy is not with your time.


End file.
